Dramatic gains in knowledge have been made in the fields of neuroscience, humandevelopment, and developmental psychopathology during the past quarter of a century. Despitethe advances that have been achieved in each discipline separately, considerably less progress hasoccurred in understanding the relation between neurobiological and behavioral development innormal and atypical populations. Research has increasingly demonstrated that abnormalities thatoccur early in development may result in the emergence of aberrant neural circuitry thateventuates in relatively enduring forms of psychopathology. Knowledge of normalneurobiological development provides a powerful foundation for understanding the contributionsthat neurodevelopmental processes make to the etiology and sequelae of psychopathology acrossthe life course. An integrated perspective wherein an appreciation of the complex neural,psychological, and social-contextual processes that cohere to bring about normal andpathological outcomes is necessary in order to advance understanding of the genesis andepigenesis of mental disorders. Such an approach will require a reduction of the schisms that sooften separate neurobiological and behavioral research.